We take for granted that if we need something, we can go shopping. We have a choice of stores and can buy what we need with the money that members of our family have earned in exchange for goods and services. It sounds simple, but it is complicated.

An economy refers to the way people use resources to make and sell goods and services. Before economies developed, money didn’t exist and people had to produce everything for themselves. When this became too time consuming, bartering began. Bartering is trading goods or services that you have, for ones you don’t have. The introduction of money allowed economies to grow.